
Class 



FT'5 






COPiT<IGHT DEPOSIT. 



PRICE,* FIFTY* CENTS. 







Pay tO'd&y, and I will trust to-morrovfr." 



BOSTON 

CUPPLES, UPHAM, & COMPANY 
Zbc ©ID Corner JSoohstore 

283 Washington Street 



886 



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THE 



Old Boston Taverns _^^ 



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AND 



TAVERN CLUBS 



BY 



SAMUEL ADAMS DRAKE, 

AUTHOR OF "OLD LANDMARKS OF BOSTON," ETC., ETC. 



<2)0«> 




BOSTON 

CUPPLES, UPHAM, & COMPANY 

Wqz ®ID Corner JBooftstore 

283 Washington Street 
1886 



Copyright, 1886, by 
SAMUEL ADAMS DRAKE. 



fRESS OF HENRY H. CLARK A CO., BOSTON. 



PREFACE. 




F what is now included in the following pages, a 
portion was read by me to the Bostonian Society 
several years ago, but not printed. Inasmuch as 
the subject brought out, incidentally, some very marked 
phases of New England life in bygone times, it proved 
to be not merely an interesting study, but one having 
some historical value as well. As such, it seems not un- 
worthy of a place in our historical literature, among the 
Old LANDM.4RKS. At least, I have thought it of suffi- 
cient importance to warrant a fuller presentation of the 
whole subject in permanent form, the more so as the 
doing this would also permit the use of unpublished 
materials chiefly collected by the late S. G. Drake, and 
now included in the Appendix. ^ ^ ^ 

BOSTON, 1886. 



CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

I. Upon the Tavern as an Institution .... 9 

II The Earlier Ordinaries 19 

III. In Revolutionary Times 33 

IV. Signboard Humor 52 

V. Appendix: Boston Taverns to the Year 1800 . . 61 



----^^v-^Of-^v-- 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 

The Sign of the Lamb I7 

The Heart and Crown 18 

The Bunch of Grapes 34 

The Cromwell's Head 44 

The Green Dragon 47 

The Brazen Head 51 

The Good Woman 52 

The Dog and Pot 53 

How Shall I Get Through This World? ... 54 

Julien House 65 

The Three Doves 70 



OI^D 30570)^ 5/ll/EI^KS 




I. 

UPON THE TAVERN AS AN INSTITUTION. 

HE famous remark of Louis XIV., "There are 
no longer any Pyrenees," may perhaps be open 
to criticism, but there are certainly no longer 
any taverns in New England. It is true that the 
statutes of the Commonwealth continue to designate 
such houses as the Brunswick and Vendome as taverns 
and their proprietors as innkeepers; yet we must msist 
.pon the truth of our assertion, the letter of the law 
to the contrary notwithstanding. 

No words need be wasted upon the present degrada- 
tion which the name of tavern implies to poUte ears. n 
nrost minds it is now associated with the slums of the 
city, and with that particular phase of city life only 
so all may agree that, as a prominent feature of soc ety 
a^d — ,°the tavern has had its day. The situation 
is easily accounted for. The simple truth is, that m 
moving on, the world has left the venerable institution 
standin. in the eighteenth century; but it is equally 
. t^ue Vat, before that time, the history of any civih.ed 
people could hardly be written without makmg great 



10 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

mention of it. AVith the disappearance of the old sign- 
boards our streets certainly have lost a most picturesque 
feature, at least one avenue is closed to art, while a 
few very aged men mourn the loss of something en- 
deared to them by many pleasant recollections. 

As an offset to the admission that the tavern has 
outlived its usefulness, we ought in justice to establish 
its actual character and standing as it was in the past. 
We shall then be the better able to judge how it was 
looked upon both from a moral and material stand-point, 
and can follow it on through successive stages of good 
or evil fortune, as we would the life of an individual. 

It fits our purpose admirably, and we are glad to 
find so eminent a scholar and divine as Dr. D wight par- 
ticularly explicit on this point. He tells us that, in his 
day, "The best old-fashioned New England inns were 
superior to any of the modern ones. There was less bus- 
tle, less parade, less appearance of doing a great deal to 
gratify your wishes, than at the reputable modern inns; 
but much more was actually done, and there was much 
more comfort and enjoyment. In a word, you found in 
these inns the pleasures of an excellent private house. 
If you were sick you were nursed and befriended as 
in your own family. To finish the story, your bills were 
always equitable, calculated on what you ought to pay, 
and not upon the scheme of getting the most which 
extortion might think proper to demand." 

Now this testimonial to what the public inn was 
eighty odd years ago comes with authority from one 



THE TAVERN AS AN INSTITUTION. 11 

who had visited every nook and corner of New England, 
was so keen and capable an observer, and is always 
a faithful recorder of what he saw. Dr. Dwight has 
frequently said that during his travels he often "found 
his warmest welcome at an inn." 

In order to give the history of what may be called 
the Eise and Fall of the Tavern among us, we should 
go back to the earliest settlements, to the very be- 
ginning of things. In our own country the Pilgrim 
Fathers justly stand for the highest type of public and 
private morals. No less would be conceded them by 
the most unfriendly critic. Intemperance, extravagant 
living, or immorality found no harborage on Plymouth 
Eock, no matter under what disguise it might come. 
Because they were a virtuous and sober people, they 
had been filled with alarm for their own youth, lest 
the example set by the Hollanders should corrupt the 
stay and prop of their community. Indeed, Bradford 
tells us fairly that this was one determining cause of 
the removal into New England. 

The institution of taverns among the Pilgrims fol- 
lowed close upon the settlement. Not only were they 
a recognized need, but, as one of the time-honored in- 
stitutions of the old country, no one seems to have 
thought of denouncing them as an evil, or even as a 
necessary evil. Travellers and sojourners had to be 
provided for even in a wilderness. Therefore taverns 
were licensed as fast as new villages grew up. Upward 
of a dozen were licensed at one sitting of the General 



12 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

Court. The usual form of concession is that So-and-So 
is licensed to draw wine and beer for the public. The 
supervision was strict, but not more so than the spirit 
of a patriarchal community, founded on morals, would 
seem to require ; but there were no such attempts to 
cover up the true character of the tavern as we have 
seen practised in the cities of this Commonwealth for 
the purpose of evading the strict letter of the law; 
and the law then made itself respected. An inn- 
keeper was not then looked upon as a person who was 
pursuing a disgraceful or immoral calling, — a sort of 
outcast, as it were, — but, while strictly held amenable 
to the law, he was actually taken under its protection. 
For instance, he was fined for selling any one person an 
immoderate quantity of liquor, and he was also liable 
to a fine if he refused to sell the quantity allowed to 
be drank on the premises, though no record is found of 
a prosecution under this singular statutory provision ; 
still, for some time, this regulation was continued in 
force as the only logical way of dealing with the liquor 
question, as it then presented itself. 

When* the law also prohibited a citizen from enter- 
tainincf a stran^^er in his own house, unless he fjjave 
bonds for his guest's good behavior, the tavern occupied 
a place between the community and the outside world 
not wholly unlike that of a moral quarantine. The 
town constable could keep a watchful eye upon all 
suspicious characters with greater ease when they were 
under one roof. Then it was his business to know 



THE TAVERN AS AN INSTITUTION. 13 

everybody's, so that any show of mystery about it 
would have settled, definitely, the stranger's status, as 
being no better than he should be. "Mind your own 
business," is a maxim hardly yet domesticated in New 
England, outside of our cities, or likely to become sud- 
denly popular in our rural communities, where, in those 
good old days we are talking about, a public official 
was always a public inquisitor, as well as newsbearer 
from house to house. 

On their part, the Puritan Fathers seem to have taken 
the tavern under strict guardianship from the very first. 
In 1634, when the price of labor and everything else 
was regulated, sixpence was the legal charge for a meal, 
and a penny for an ale quart of beer, at an inn, and 
the landlord was liable to ten shillings fine if a greater 
charge was made. Josselyn, who was in New England 
at a very early day, remarks, that, "At the tap-houses 
of Boston I have had an ale quart of cider, spiced and 
sweetened with sugar, for a groat." So the fact that 
the law once actually prescribed how much should be 
paid for a morning dram may be set down among the 
curiosities of colonial legislation. 

No later than the year 1647 the number of applicants 
for licenses to keep taverns had so much increased that 
the following act was passed by our General Court for 
its own relief: "It is ordered by the authority of this 
court, that henceforth all such as are to keep houses 
of common entertainment, and to retail wine, beer, etc., 
shall be licensed at the county courts of the shire where 



14 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

they live, or the Court of Assistants, so as this court 
may not be thereby hindered in their more weighty 
affairs." 

A noticeable thing about this particular bill is, that 
when it went down for concurrence the word " deputies " 
was erased and "house" substituted by the speaker in 
its stead, thus showing that the newly born popular 
body had begun to assert itself as the only true repre- 
sentative cliamber, and meant to show the more aristo- 
cratic branch that the sovereign people had spoken 
at last. 

By the time Philip's war had broken out, in 1675, 
taverns had become so numerous that Cotton Mather 
has said that every other house in Boston was one. 
Indeed, the calamity of the war itself was attributed 
to the number of tippling-houses in the colony. At 
any rate this was one of the alleged sins which, in the 
opinion of Mather, had called down upon the colony 
the frown of Providence. A century later. Governor 
Pownall repeated Mather's statement. So it is quite 
evident that the increase of taverns, both good and bad, 
liad kept pace with the growth of the country. 

It is certain that, at the time of which we are speak- 
ing, some of the old laws affecting the drinking habits 
of society were openly disregarded. Drinking healths, 
for instance, though under the ban of the law, was still 
practised in Cotton Mather's day by those who met 
at the social board. We find him defending it as a 
common form of politeness, and not the invocation of 



THE TAVERN AS AN INSTITUTION. 15 

Heaven it had once been in the days of chivahy. Drink- 
ing at funerals, weddings, church-raisings, and even at 
ordinations, was a thing everywhere sanctioned by cus- 
tom. The person who should have refused to furnish 
liquor on such an occasion would have been the subject 
of remarks not at all complimentary to his motives. 

It seems curious enough to find that the use of 
tobacco was looked upon by the fathers of the colony 
as far more sinful, hurtful, and degrading than indul- 
gence in intoxicating liquors. Indeed, in most of the 
New England settlements, not only the use but the 
planting of tobacco was strictly forbidden. Those who 
had a mind to solace themselves with the interdicted 
weed could do so only in the most private manner. The 
language of the law is, " Nor shall any take tobacco in 
any wine or common victual house, except in a private 
room there, so as the master of said house nor any 
guest there shall take offence thereat ; which, if any do, 
then such person shall forbear upon pain of two shillings 
sixpence for every such offence." 

It is found on record that two innocent Dutchmen, 
who went on a visit to Harvard College, — when that 
venerable institution was much younger than it is to- 
day, — were so nearly choked with the fumes of tobacco- 
smoke, on first going in, that one said to the other, 
"This is certainly a tavern." 

It is also curious to note that, in spite of the steady 
growth of the smoking habit among all classes of people, 
public opinion continued to uphold the laws directed to 



IQ OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

its suppression, though, from our stand-point of to-day, 
these do seem uncommonly severe. And this state of 
things existed down to so late a day that men are now 
living who have been asked to plead "guilty or not 
guilty," at the bar of a police court, for smoking in the 
streets of Boston. A dawning sense of the ridiculous, 
it is presumed, led at last to the discontinuance of ar- 
rests for this cause; but for some time longer officers 
were in the habit of inviting detected smokers to show 
respect for the memory of a defunct statute of the Com- 
monwealth, by throwing their cigars into the gutter. 

Turning to practical considerations, we shall find the 
tavern holding an important relation to its locality. In 
the first place, it being so nearly coeval with the laying 
out of villages, the tavern quickly became the one known 
landmark for its particular neighborhood. Tor instance, 
in Boston alone, the names Seven Star Lane, Orange 
Tree Lane, Eed Lion Lane, Black Horse Lane, Sun 
Court, Cross Street, Bull Lane, not to mention others 
that now have so outlandish a sound to, sensitive ears, 
were all derived from taverns. We risk little in saying 
that a Bostonian in London would think the great me- 
tropolis strangely altered for the worse should he find 
such hallowed names as Charing Cross, Bishopsgate, or 
Temple Bar replaced by those of some wealthy Smith, 
Brown, or Eobinson ; yet he looks on, while the same 
sort of vandalism is constantly going on at home, with 
hardly a murmur of disapproval, so differently does the 
same thing look from different points of view. 



THE TAVEEN AS AN INSTITUTION. 17 

As further fixing the topographical character of tav- 
erns, it may be stated that in the old almanacs dis- 
tances are always computed between the inns, instead 
of from town to town, as the practice now is. 

Of course such topographical distinctions as we have 
pointed out began at a time when there were few public 
buildings; but the idea almost amounts to an instinct, 
because even now it is a common habit with every one 
to first direct the inquiring stranger to some prominent 
landmark. As such, tavern-signs were soon known and 
noted by all travellers. 




SIGN OP THE LAMB. 



Then again, tavern-titles are, in most cases, traced 
back to the old country. Love for the old home and 
its associations made the colonist like to take his mug 
of ale under the same sign that he had patronized when 
in England. It was a never-failing reminiscence to him. 
And innkeepers knew how to appeal to this feeling. 



18 



OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 



Hence the Eed Lion and the Lamb, the St. George and 
the Green Dragon, the Black, White, and Red Horse, 
the Sun, Seven Stars, and Globe, were each and all so 
many reminiscences of Old London. In their way they 
denote the same sort of tie that is perpetuated by the 
Bostons, Portsmouths, Falmouths, and other names of 
English origin. 




II. 



THE EARLIER ORDINARIES. 




S early as 1638 there were at least two ordi- 
naries, as taverns were then called, in Boston. 
That they were no ordinary taverns will at 
once occur to every one who considers the means then 
employed to secure sobriety and good order in them. 
For example, Josselyn says that when a stranger went 
into one for the purpose of refreshing the inner man, 
he presently found a constable at his elbow, who, it 
appeared, was there to see to it that the guest called 
for no more liquor than seemed good for him. If he 
did so, the beadle peremptorily countermanded the 
order, himself fixing the quantity to be drank ; and from 
his decision there was no appeal. 

Of these early ordinaries the earliest known to be 
licensed sroes as far back as 1634, when Samuel Cole, 
comfit-maker, kept it. A kind of interest naturally 
goes with the spot of ground on which this the first 
house of public entertainment in the New England 
metropolis stood. On this point all the early authori- 
ties seem to have been at fault. Misled by the meagre 

19 



20 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

record in the Book of Possessions, the zealous antiqua- 
ries of former years had always located Cole's Inn in 
what is now Merchants' Row. Since Thomas Lechford's 
Note Book has been printed, the copy of a deed, dated 
in the year 1638, in which Cole conveys part of his 
dwelling, with brew-house, etc., has been brought to 
light. The estate noted here is the one situated next 
northerly from the well-known Old Corner Bookstore, 
on Washington Street. It would, therefore, appear, be- 
yond reasonable doubt, that Cole's Inn stood in what 
was already the high street of the town, nearly opposite 
Governor Winthrop's, which gives greater point to my 
Lord Leigh's refusal to accept Winthrop's proffered hos- 
pitality when his lordship was sojourning under Cole's 
roof-tree. 

In his New England Tragedies, Mr. Longfellow intro- 
duces Cole, who is made to say, — 

"But the 'Three Mariners' is an orderly, 
Most orderly, quiet, and respectable house." 

Cole, certainly, could have had no other than a poet's 
license for calling his house by this name, as it is never 
mentioned otherwise than as Cole's Inn. 

Another of these worthy landlords was William Hud- 
son, who had leave to keep an ordinary in 1640. From 
his occupation of baker, he easily stepped into the con- 
genial employment of innkeeper. Hudson was among 
the earliest settlers of Boston, and for many years is 
found most active in town affairs. His name is on the 



THE EARLIER ORDINARIES. 21 

list of those wlio were admitted freemen of the Colony, 
in May, 1631. As his son William also followed the 
same caUing, the distinction of Senior and Junior be- 
comes necessary when speaking of them. 

Hudson's house is said to have stood on the ground 
now occupied by the New England Bank, which, if true, 
would make this the most noted of tavern stands in all 
New England, or rather in all the colonies, as the same 
site afterward became known as the Bunch of Grapes. 
We shall have much occasion to notice it under that 
title. In Hudson's time the appearance of things about 
this locality was very different from what is seen to-day. 
All the earlier topographical features have been obUter- 
ated. Then the tide flowed nearly up to the tavern 
door, so making the spot a landmark of the ancient 
shore line as the first settlers had found it. Even so 
simple a statement as this will serve to show us how 
difficult is the task of fixing, with approximate accuracy, 
residences or sites on the water front, going as far back 
as the original occupants of the soil. 

Next in order of time comes the house called the 
King's Arms. This celebrated inn stood at the head of 
the dock, in what is now Dock Square. Hugh Gunnison, 
victualler, kept a " cooke's shop " in his dwelling there 
some time before 1642, as he was then allowed to sell 
beer. The next year he humbly prayed the court for 
leave " to draw the wyne which was spent in his house," 
in the room of having his customers get it elsewhere, 
and then come into his place the worse for liquor,— 



22 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

a proceeding which he justly thought unfair as well as 
unprofitable dealing. He asks this favor in order that 
" God be not dishonored nor his people grieved." 

We know that Gunnison was favored with the custom 
of the General Court, because we find that body voting 
to defray the expenses incurred for being entertained in 
his house " out of y^ custom of wines or y® wampum of 
y® Narragansetts." 

Gunnison's house presently took the not always popu- 
lar name of the King's Arms, which it seems to have 
kept until the general overturning of thrones in the Old 
Country moved the Puritan rulers to order the taking 
down of the King's arms, and setting up of the State's 
in their stead ; for, until the restoration of the Stuarts, 
the tavern is the same, we think, known as the State's 
Arms. It then loyally resumed its old insignia again. 
Such little incidents show us how taverns frequently 
denote the fluctuation of popular opinion. 

As Gunnison's bill of fare has not come down to us, 
we are at a loss to know just how the colonial fathers 
fared at his hospitable board ; but so long as the ' treat ' 
was had at the public expense we cannot doubt that 
the dinners were quite as good as the larder afforded, 
or that full justice was done to the contents of mine 
host's cellar by those worthy legislators and lawgivers. 

When Hugh Gunnison sold out the Kings Arms to 
Henry Shrimpton and others, in 1651, for £600 sterling, 
the rooms in his house all bore some distinguishing 
name or title. For instance, one chamber was called 



THE EARLIER ORDINARIES. 23 

the "Exchange." We have sometimes wondered whether 
it was so named in consequence of its use by merchants 
of the town as a regular place of meeting. The chamber 
referred to was furnished with " one half-headed bedstead 
with blew pillars." There was also a " Court Chamber," 
which, doubtless, was the one assigned to the General 
Court when dining at Gunnison's. Still other rooms went 
by such names as the " London " and " Star." The hall 
contained three small rooms, or stalls, with a bar con- 
venient to it. This room was for public use, but the 
apartments upstairs were for the " quality " alone, or for 
those who paid for the privilege of being private. All 
remember how, in " She Stoops to Conquer," Miss Hard- 
castle is made to say: "Attend the Lion, there! — Pipes 
and tobacco for the Angel ! — The Lamb has been out- 
rageous this half hour ! " 

The Castle Tavern was another house of public resort, 
kept by William Hudson, Jr., at what is now the upper 
corner of Elm Street and Dock Square. Just at what 
time this noted tavern came into being is a matter ex- 
tremely difficult to be determined ; but, as we find a 
colonial order billeting soldiers in it in 1656, we con- 
clude it to have been a public inn at that early day. 
At this time Hudson is styled lieutenant. If Whitman's 
records of the Artillery Company be taken as correct, 
the younger Hudson had seen service in the wars. With 
" divers other of our best military men," he had crossed 
the ocean to take service in the Parliamentary forces, in 
which he held the rank of ensign, returning home to 



24 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

New England, after an absence of two years, to find his 
wife publicly accused of faithlessness to her marriage 
vows. 

The presence of these old inns at the head of the 
town dock naturally points to that locality as the 
business centre, and it continued to hold that relation 
to the commerce of Boston until, by the building of 
wharves and piers, ships were enabled to come up to 
them for the purpose of unloading. Before that time 
their cargoes were landed in boats and lighters. Far 
back, in the beginning of things, when everything had 
to be transported by water to and from the neighboring 
settlements, this was naturally the busiest place in 
Boston. In time Dock Square became, as its name in- 
dicates, a sort of delta for the confluent lanes running 
down to the dock below it. 

Here, for a time, was centred all the movement to 
and from the shipping, and, we may add, about all the 
commerce of the infant settlement. Naturally the vicin- 
ity was most convenient for exposing for sale all sorts 
of merchandise as it was landed, which fact soon led to 
the establishment of a corn market on one side of the 
dock and a fish market on the other side. 

The Royal Exchange stood on the site of the Mer- 
chants' Bank, in State Street. In this high-sounding 
name we find a sure sign that the town had outgrown 
its old traditions and was making progress toward more 
citified ways. As time wore on a town-house had been 
built in the market-place. Its ground floor was pur- 



THE EARLIER ORDINARIES. 25 

posely left open for the citizens to walk about, discuss 
the news, or bargain in. In the popular phrase, they 
were said to meet "on 'change," and thereafter this 
place of meeting was known as the Exchange, which 
name the tavern and lane soon took to themselves as 
a natural right. 

A glance at the locality in question shows the choice 
to have been made with a shrewd eye to the future. 
For example : the house fronted upon the town market- 
place, where, on stated days, fairs or markets for the 
sale of country products were held. On one side the 
tavern was flanked by the well-trodden lane which led 
to the town dock. From daily chaffering in a small 
way, those who wished to buy or sell came to meet 
here regularly. It also became the place for popular 
gatherings, — on such occasions of ceremony as the pub- 
lishing of proclamations, mustering of troops, or punish- 
ment of criminals, — all of which vindicates its title to 
be called the heart of the little commonwealth. 

Indeed, on this spot the pulse of its daily life beat 
with ever-increasing vigor. Hither came the country 
people, with their donkeys and panniers. Here in the 
open air they set up their little booths to tempt the 
town's folk with the display of fresh country butter, 
cheese and eggs, fruits or vegetables. Here came the 
citizen, with his basket on his arm, exchanging his 
stock of news or opinions as he bargained for his 
dinner, and so caught the drift of popular sentiment 
beyond his own chimney-corner. 



26 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

To loiter a little longer at the sign of the Royal 
Exchange, which, by all accounts, always drew the best 
custom of the town, we find that, as long ago as Luke 
Vardy's time, it was a favorite resort of the Masonic 
fraternity, Vardy being a brother of the order. Accord- 
ing to a poetic squib of the time, — 

" 'Twas he who oft dispelled their sadness, 
And filled the breth'ren's hearts with gladness." 

After the burning of the town-house, near by, in the 
winter of 1747, had turned the General Court out of 
doors, that body finished its sessions at Vardy's ; nor do 
we find any record of legislation touching Luke's tap- 
room on that occasion. 

Vardy's w^as the resort of the young bloods of the 
town, who spent their evenings in drinking, gaming, or 
recounting their love affairs. One July evening, in 1728, 
two young men belonging to the first families in the 
province quarreled over their cards or wine. A chal- 
lenge passed. At that time the sword was the weapon 
of gentlemen. The parties repaired to a secluded part 
of the Common, stripped for the encounter, and fought 
it out by the light of the moon. After a few passes 
one of the combatants, named Woodbridge, received a 
mortal thrust; the survivor was hurried off' by his 
friends on board a ship, which immediately set sail. 
This being the first duel ever fought in the town, it 
naturally made a great stir. 

We cannot leave the neighborhood without at least 



THE EARLIER ORDINARIES. 27 

making mention of the Massacre of the 5th of March, 
1770, which took place in front of the tavern. It 
was then a three-story brick house, the successor, it is 
believed, of the first building erected on the spot and 
destroyed in the great fire of 1711. On the opposite 
corner of the lane stood the Eoyal Custom House, where 
a sentry was walking his lonely round on that frosty 
night, little dreaming of the part he was to play in the 
coming tragedy. With the assault made by the mob 
on thFs sentinel, the fatal affray began which sealed 
the cause of the colonists with their blood. At this 
time the tavern enjoyed the patronage of the newly 
arrived British officers of the army and navy as well as 
of citizens or placemen, of the Tory party, so that its 
inmates must have witnessed, with peculiar feelings, 
every incident of that night of terror. Consequently 
the house with its sign is shown in Eevere's well-known 
picture of the massacre. 

One more old hostelry in this vicinity merits a word 
from us. Though not going so far back or coming down 
to so late a date as some of the houses already men- 
tioned, nevertheless it has ample claim not to be passed 
by in silence. 

The Anchor, otherwise the " Blew Anchor,", stood on 
the ground now occupied by the Globe newspaper build- 
ing. In early times it divided with the State's Arms 
the patronage of the magistrates, who seem to have 
had a custom, perhaps not yet quite out of date, of 
adjourning to the ordinary over the way after trans- 



28 OLD BOSTON TAVERN'S. 

acting the business which had brought them together. 
So we find that the commissioners of the United Colonies, 
and even the reverend clergy, when they were summoned 
to the colonial capital to attend a synod, were usually 
entertained here at the Anchor. 

This fact presupposes a house having what we should 
now call the latest improvements, or at least possessing 
some advantages over its older rivals in the excellence 
of its table or cellarage. When Eobert Turner kept it, 
his rooms were distinguished, after the manner of the 
old London inns, as the Cross Keys, Green Dragon, 
Anchor and Castle Chamber, Eose and Sun, Low Room, 
so making old associations bring in custom. 

It was in 1686 that John Dunton, a London bookseller 
whom Pope lampoons in the "Dunciad," came over to 
Boston to do a little business in the bookselling line. 
The vicinity of the town-house was then crowded with 
book-shops, all of which drove a thriving trade in print- 
ing and selling sermons, almanacs, or fugitive essays of 
a sort now quite unknown outside of a few eager col- 
lectors. The time was a critical one in New England, as 
she was feeling the tremor of the coming revolt which 
sent King James into exile ; yet to read Dunton's ac- 
count of men and things as he thought he saw them, 
one would imagine him just dropped into Arcadia, rather 
than breathing the threatening atmosphere of a country 
that was tottering on the edge of revolution. 

But it is to him, at any rate, that we are indebted 
for a portrait of the typical landlord, — one whom we 



THE EARLIER ORDINARIES. 



29 



feel at once we should like to have known, and, having 
known, to cherish in our memory. With a flourish of 
his goose-quill Dunton introduces us to George Monk, 
landlord of the Anchor, who, somehow, reminds us of 
Chaucer's Harry Bailly, and Ben Jonson's Goodstock. 
And we more than suspect from what follows that 
Dunton had tasted the ''Anchor" Madeira, not only 
once, but again. 

George Monk, mine host of the Anchor, Dunton tells 
us, was "a person so remarkable that, had I not been 
acquainted with him, it would be a hard matter to 
make any New England man believe that I had been 
in Boston; for there was no one house in all the town 
more noted, or where a man might meet with better 
accommodation. Besides he was a brisk and jolly man, 
whose conversation was coveted by all his guests as 
the life and spirit of the company." 

In this off-hand sketch we behold the traditional pub- 
lican, now, alas! extinct. Gossip, newsmonger, banker, 
pawnbroker, expediter of men or effects, the intimate 
association so long existing between landlord and public 
under the old regime everywhere brought about a still 
closer one among the guild itself, so establishing a net- 
work of communication coextensive with all the great 
routes from Maine to Georgia. 

Situated just "around the corner" from the council- 
chamber, the Anchor became, as we have seen, the 
favorite haunt of members of the government, and so 
acquired something of an official character and stand- 



30 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

ing. We have strong jeason to believe that, under the 
mellowing influence of the punch-bowl, those antique 
men of iron mould and mien could now and then crack 
a grim jest or tell a story or possibly troll a love-ditty, 
with grave gusto. At any rate, we find Chief Justice 
Sewall jotting down in his "Diary" the familiar sentence, 
"The deputies treated and I treated." And, to tell the 
truth, we would much prefer to think of the colonial 
fathers as possessing even some human frailties rather 
than as the statues now replacing their living forms 
and features in our streets. 

But now and then we can imagine the noise of great 
merriment making the very windows of some of these 
old hostelries rattle again. We learn that the Grey- 
hound was a respectable public house, situated in Rox- 
bury, and of very early date too ; for the venerable and 
saintly Eliot lived upon one side and his pious colleague, 
Samuel Danforth, on the other. Yet notwithstanding 
its being, as it were, hedged in between two such emi- 
nent pillars of the church, the godly Danforth bitterly 
complains of the provocation which frequenters of the 
tavern sometimes tried him withal, and naively informs 
us that, when from his study windows he saw any of 
the town dwellers loitering there he would go down 
and "chide them away." 

It is related in the memoirs of the celebrated Indian 
fighter, Captain Benjamin Church, that he and Captain 
Converse once found themselves in the neighborhood of 
a tavern at the South End of Boston. As old comrades 



THE EARLIER ORDINARIES. 31 

they wished to go in and take a parting glass together; 
but, on searching their pockets, Church could find only 
sixpence and Converse not a penny to bless himself 
with, so they were compelled to forego this pledge of 
friendship and part with thirsty lips. Going on to 
Eoxbury, Church luckily found an old neighbor of his, 
who generously lent him money enough to get home 
with. He tells the anecdote in order to show to what 
straits the parsimony of the Massachusetts rulers had 
reduced him, their great captain, to whom the colony 
owed so much. 

The Red Lion, in North Street, was one of the oldest 
public houses, if not the oldest, to be opened at the 
North End of the town. It stood close to the waterside, 
the adjoining wharf and the lane running down to it 
both belonging to the house and both taking its name. 
The old Eed Lion Lane is now Eichmond Street, and 
the wharf has been filled up, so making identification 
of the old sites difficult, to say the least. Nicholas Up- 
shall, the stout-hearted Quaker, kept the Bed Lion as 
early as 1654. At his death the land on which tavern 
and brewhouse stood went to his children. When the 
persecution of his sect began in earnest, Upshall was 
thrown into Boston jail, for his outspoken condemnation 
of the authorities and their rigorous proceedings toward 
this people. He was first doomed to perpetual imprison- 
ment. A long and grievous confinement at last broke 
Upshall's health, if it did not, ultimately, prove the 
cause of his death. 



32 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

The Ship Tavern stood at the head of Clark's Wharf, 
or on the southwest corner of North and Clark streets, 
accordmg to present boundaries. It was an ancient 
brick building, dating as far back as 1650 at least. 
John Vyal kept it in 1663. When Clark's Wharf was 
built it was the principal one of the town. Large ships 
came directly up to it, so making the tavern a most 
convenient resort for masters of vessels or their passen- 
gers, and associating it with the locality itself. King 
Charles's commissioners lodged at Vyal's house, when 
they undertook the task of bringing down the pride of 
the rulers of the colony a peg. One of them. Sir Eobert 
Carr, pummeled a constable who attempted to arrest him 
in this house. He afterward refused to obey a summons 
to answer for the assault before the magistrates, loftily 
alleging His Majesty's commission as superior to any 
local mandate whatever. He thus retaliated Governor 
Leverett's affront to the commissioners in keeping his hat 
on his head when their authority to act was being read 
to the council. But Leverett was a man who had served 
under Cromwell, and had no love for the cavaliers or 
they for him. The commissioners sounded trumpets and 
made proclamations ; but the colony kept on the even 
tenor of its way, in defiance of the royal mandate, equally 
regardless of the storm gathering about it, as of the 
magnitude of the conflict in which it was about to 
plunge, all unarmed and unprepared. 



III. 



IN REVOLUTIOIS^ARY TIMES. 




UCH thoroughfares as King Street, just before 
the Ee volution, were filled with horsemen, don- 
keys, oxen, and long-tailed trucks, with a sprink- 
ling of one-horse chaises and coaches of the kind seen 
in Hogarth's realistic pictures of London life. To these 
should be added the chimney-sweeps, wood-sawyers, 
market-women, soldiers, and sailors, who are now quite 
as much out of date as the vehicles themselves are. 
There being no sidewalks, the narrow footway was pro- 
tected, here and there, sometimes by posts, sometimes by 
an old cannon set upright at the corners, so that the 
traveller dismounted from his horse or alighted from 
coach or chaise at the very threshold. 

Next in the order of antiquity, as well as fame, to 
the taverns already named, comes the Bunch of Grapes 
in King, now State Street. The plain three-story stone 
building situated at the upper corner of Kilby Street 
stands where the once celebrated tavern did. Three 
gilded clusters of grapes dangled temptingly over the 
door before the eye of the passer-by. Apart from its 

33 



34 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

palate-tickling suggestions, a pleasant aroina of antiquity 
surrounds this symbol, so dear to all devotees of Bacchus 




THE BUNCH OF GRAPES. 

from immemorial time. In Measure for Measure the 
clown says, "'Twas in the Bunch of Grapes, where in- 
deed you have a delight to sit, have you not ? " And 
Froth answers, *'I have so, because it is an open room 
and good for winter." 

This house goes back to the year 1712, when Francis 
Holmes kept it, and perhaps further still, though we do 
not meet with it under this title before Holmes's time. 
From that time, until after the Eevolution, it appears to 
have always been open as a public inn, and, as such, is 
feelingly referred to by one old traveller as the best 
punch-house to be found in all Boston. 

When the line came to be drawn between conditional 
loyalty, and loyalty at any rate, the Bunch of Grapes 
became the resort of the High Whigs, who made it a 
sort of political headquarters, in which patriotism only 
passed current, and it was known as the Whig tavern. 



IN REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. 35 

With military occupation and bayonet rule, still further 
intensifying public feeling, the line between Whig and 
Tory houses was drawn at the threshold. It was then 
kept by Marston. Cold welcome awaited the appear- 
ance of scarlet regimentals or a Tory phiz there; so 
gentlemen of that side of politics also formed cliques 
of their own at other houses, in which the talk and 
the toasts were more to their liking, and where they 
could abuse the Yankee rebels over their port to their 
heart's content. 

But, apart from political considerations, one or two 
incidents have given the Bunch of Grapes a kind of 
pre-eminence over all its contemporaries, and, therefore, 
ought not to be passed over when the house is men- 
tioned. 

On Monday, July 30, 1733, the first grand lodge of 
Masons in America was organized here by Henry Price, 
a Boston tailor, who had received authority from Lord 
Montague, Grand Master of England, for the purpose. 

Again, upon the evacuation of Boston by the royal 
troops, this house became the centre for popular demon- 
strations. First, His Excellency, General Washington, 
was handsomely entertained there. Some months later, 
after hearing the Declaration read from the balcony of 
the Town-house, the populace, having thus made their 
appeal to the King of kings, proceeded to pull down 
from the public buildings the royal arms which had dis- 
tinguished them, and, gathering them in a heap in front 
of the tavern, made a bonfire of them, little imagining, 



36 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

we think, that the time would ever come when the act 
would be looked upon as vandalism on their part. 

General Stark's timely victory at Bennington was cele- 
brated with all the more heartiness of enthusiasm in 
Boston because the people had been quaking with fear 
ever since the fall of Ticonderoga sent dismay through- 
out New England. The affair is accurately described in 
the following letter, written by a prominent actor, and 
going to show how such things were done in the times 
that not only tried men's souls, but would seem also to 
have put their stomachs to a pretty severe test. The 
writer says: — 

" In consequence of this news we kept it up in high 
taste. At sundown about one hundred of the first 
gentlemen of the town, with all the strangers then in 
Boston, met at the Bunch of Grapes, where good liquors 
and a side-table were provided. In the street were two 
brass field-pieces with a detachment of Colonel Craft's 
regiment. In the balcony of the Town-house all the 
fifes and drums of my regiment were stationed. The 
ball opened with a discharge of thirteen cannon, and 
at every toast given three rounds were fired and a flight 
of rockets sent up. About nine o'clock two barrels of 
grog were brought out into the street for the people 
that had collected there. It was all conducted with 
the greatest propriety, and by ten o'clock every man 
was at his home." 

Shortly after this General Stark himself arrived in 
town and was right royally entertained here, at that time 



IN REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. 37 

presenting the trophies now adorning the Senate Cham- 
ber. On his return from France in 1780 Lafayette was 
also received at this house with all the honors, on ac- 
count of having brought the news that France had at 
last cast her puissant sword into the trembling balance 
of our Eevolutionary contest. 

But the important event with which the Bunch of 
Grapes is associated is, not the reception of a long line 
of illustrious guests, but the organization, by a number 
of continental officers, of the Ohio Company, under which 
the settlement of that great State began in earnest, at 
Marietta. The leading spirit in this first concerted 
movement of New England toward the Great West was 
General Eufus Putnam, a cousin of the more distin- 
guished officer of Eevolutionary fame. 

Taking this house as a sample of the best that the 
town could afford at the beginning of the century, we 
should probably find a company of about twenty persons 
assembled at dinner, who were privileged to indulge in 
as much familiar chat as they liked. No other formali- 
ties were observed than such as good breeding required. 
Two o'clock was the hour at which all the town dined. 
The guests were called together by the ringing of a bell 
in the street. They were served with salmon in season, 
veal, beef, mutton, fowl, ham, vegetables, and pudding, and 
each one had his pint of Madeira set before him. The 
carving was done at the table in the good old English 
way, each guest helping himself to what he liked best. 
Five shillings per day was the usual charge, which was 



38 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

certainly not an exorbitant one. In half an hour after 
the cloth was removed the table was usually deserted. 

The British Coffee-House was one of the first inns to 
take to itself the newly imported title. It stood on the 
site of the granite building numbered 66 State Street, 
and was, as its name implies, as emphatically the head- 
quarters of the out-and-out loyalists as the Bunch of 
Grapes, over the way, was of the unconditional Whigs. 
A notable thing about it was the performance there in 

1750, probably by amateurs, of Otway's "Orphan," an 
event which so outraged public sentiment as to cause 
the enactment of a law prohibiting the performance of 
stage plays under severe penalties. 

Perhaps an even more notable occurrence was the 
formation in this house of the first association in Boston 
taking to itself the distinctive name of a Club. The 
Merchants' Club, as it was called, met here as early as 

1751. Its membership was not restricted to merchants, 
as might be inferred from its title, though they were pos- 
sibly in a majority, but included crown officers, members 
of the bar, military and naval officers serving on the 
station, and gentlemen of high social rank of every 
shade of opinion. No others were eligible to member- 
ship. 

Up to a certain time this club, undoubtedly, repre- 
sented the best culture, the most brilliant wit, and most 
delightful companionship that could be brought together 
in all the colonies ; but when the political sky grew 
dark the old harmony was at an end, and a division 



IN REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. 39 

became inevitable, the Whigs going over to the Bunch 
of Grapes, and thereafter taking to themselves the name 
of the Whig Club.i 

Under date of 1771, John Adams notes down in his 
Diary this item : " Spent the evening at Cordis's, in the 
front room towards the Long Wharf, where the Mer- 
chants' Club has met these twenty years. It seems 
there is a schism in that church, a rent in that gar- 
ment." Cordis was then the landlord.^ 

Social and business meetings of the bar were also held 
at the Coffee-House, at one of which Josiah Quincy, Jr. 
was admitted. By and by the word "American" was 
substituted for "British" on the Coffee-House sign, and 
for some time it flourished under its new title of the 
American Coffee-House. 

But before the clash of opinions had brought about 

1 Cordis's bill for a dinner given by Governor Hancock to the 
Fusileers at this house in 1792 is a veritable curiosity in its 
way : — 

^ £ s. p. 

136 Bowls of Punch 15 6 

80 Dinners 8 

21 Bottles of Sherry 4 11 6 

Brandy 2 6 

2 A punch-bowl on which is engraved the names of seventeen 
members of the old Whig Club is, or was, in the possession of R. 
C. Mackay of Boston. Besides those already mentioned, Dr. Church, 
Dr. Young, Richard Derby of Salem, Benjamin Kent, Nathaniel 
Barber, William Mackay, and Colonel Timothy Bigelow of Worces- 
ter were also influential members. The Club corresponded with 
Wilkes, Saville, Barre, and Sawbridge, — all leading Whigs, and all 
opponents of the coercive measures directed against the Americans. 



40 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

the secession just mentioned, the best room in this house 
held almost nightly assemblages of a group of patriotic 
men, who were actively consolidating all the elements 
of opposition into a single force. iSTot inaptly they might 
be called the Old Guard of the Eevolution. The prin- 
cipals were Otis, Gushing, John Adams, Pitts, Dr. "VVarren, 
and Molyneux. Probably no minutes of their proceed- 
ings were kept, for the excellent reason that they verged 
upon, if they did not overstep, the treasonable. 

His talents, position at the bar, no less than intimate 
knowledge of the questions which were then so pro- 
foundly agitating the public mind, naturally made Otis 
the leader in these conferences, in which the means for 
counteracting the aggressive measures then being put 
in force by the ministry formed the leading topic of 
discussion. His acute and logical mind, mastery of 
public law, intensity of purpose, together with the keen 
and biting satire which he knew so well how to call 
to his aid, procured for Otis the distinction of being the 
best-hated man on the Whig side of politics, because he 
was the one most feared. Whether in the House, the 
court-room, the taverns, or elsewhere, Otis led the van 
of resistance. In military phrase, his policy was the 
offensive-defensive. He was no respecter of ignorance in 
high places. Once when Governor Bernard sneeringly 
interrupted Otis to ask him who the authority was 
whom he was citing, the patriot coldly replied, "He 
is a very eminent jurist, and none the less so for being 
unknown to your Excellency." 



IN BEVOLUTIOXAET TIMES. 41 

It was in the Coffee-House that Otis, in attempting to 
pull a Tory nose, was set upon and so brutally beaten 
by a place-man named Eobinson, and his friends, as to 
ultimately cause the loss of his reason and final with- 
drawal from public life. John Adams says he was 
"basely assaulted by a well-dressed banditti, with a 
commissioner of customs at their head." What they had 
never been able to compass by fair argument, the Tories 
now succeeded in accomphshing by brute force, since 
Otis was forever disqualified from taking part in the 
struggle which he had all along foreseen was coming, — 
and which, indeed, he had done more to bring about 
than any single man in the colonies. 

Connected with this affair is an anecdote which we 
think merits a place along with it. It is related by 
John Adams, who was an interested listener. William 
Molyneux had a petition before the legislature which 
did not succeed to his wishes, and for several evenings 
he had wearied the company with his complaints of 
services, losses, sacrifices, etc., always windmg up with 
saying, " That a man who has behaved as I have should 
be treated as I am is intolerable," with much more to 
the same efiect. Otis had said notliing, but the whole 
club were disgusted and out of patience, when he rose 
from his seat with the remark, "Come, come. Will, 
quit this subject, and let us enjoy ourselves. I also 
have a list of grievances ; will you hear it ? " The club 
expected some fun, so all cried out, "Ay! ay! let 
us hear your list." 



42 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

"Well, then, in the first place, I resigned the office 
of advocate-general, which I held from the crown, which 
produced me — how much do you think ? " 

"A great deal, no doubt," said Molyneux. 

"Shall we say two hundred sterling a year?" 

"Ay, more, I believe," said Molyneux. 

"Well, let it be two hundred. That, for ten years, is 
two thousand. In the next place, I have been obliged 
to relinquish the greater part of my business at the 
bar. Will you set that at two hundred pounds more ? " 

"Oh, I believe it much more than that!" was the 
answer. 

" Well, let it be two hundred. This, for ten years, 
makes two thousand. You allow, then, I have lost 
four thousand pounds sterling?" 

"Ay, and more too," said Molyneux. Otis went 
on : " In the next place, I have lost a hundred friends, 
among whom were men of the first rank, fortune, and 
power in the province. At what price will you esti- 
mate them?" 

" D — n them ! " said Molyneux, " at nothing. You 
are better off without them than with them." 

A loud laugh from the company greeted this sally. 

" Be it so," said Otis. " In the next place, I have 
made a thousand enemies, among whom are the gov- 
ernment of the province and the nation. What do you 
think of this item ? " 

"That is as it may happen," said Molyneux, reflec- 
tively. 



IN REVOLUTIONARY TIMES- 43 

"In the next place, you know I love pleasure, but 
I have renounced pleasure for ten years. What is 
that worth ? " 

" No great matter : you have made politics your amuse- 
ment." 

A hearty laugh. 

"In the next place, I have ruined as fine health as 
nature ever gave to man." 

"That is melancholy indeed; there is nothing to be 
said on that point," Molyneux replied. 

" Once more," continued Otis, holding down his head 
before Molyneux, "look upon this head!" (there was 
a deep, half-closed scar, in which a man might lay his 
finger)— "and, what is worse, my friends think I have 
a monstrous crack in my skull." 

This made all the company look grave, and had the 
desired effect of making Molyneux, who was really a 
good companion, heartily ashamed of his childish com- 
plaints. 

Another old inn of assured celebrity was the Crom- 
well's Head, in School Street. This was a two-story 
wooden building of venerable appearance, conspicuously 
displaying over the footway a grim likeness of the 
Lord Protector, it is said much to the disgust of the 
ultra royalists, who, rather than pass underneath it, 
habitually took the other side of the way. Indeed, 
some of the hot-headed Tories were for serving Crom- 
welVs Head as that man of might had served their 
martyr king's. So, when the town came under martial 



44 



OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 




law, mine host Brackett, whose family kept the house 
for half a century or more, had to take down his sign, 
and conceal it until such time as the "British hire- 
lings" should have made their inglorious exit from the 
town. 

After Braddock's crushing defeat in the West, a young 
Virginian colonel, named George Washington, was sent 
by Governor Dinwiddie to confer with Governor Shirley, 
who was the great war governor of his day, as Andrew 
was of our own, with the difference that Shirley then 
had the general direction of military affairs, from the 
Ohio to the St. Lawrence, pretty much in his own 
hands. Colonel Washington took up his quarters at 
Brackett's, little imagining, perhaps, that twenty years 
later he would enter Boston at the head of a victorious 
republican army, after having quartered his troops in 
Governor Shirley's splendid mansion. 

Major-General the Marquis Chastellux, of Rocham- 



IN EEVOLUTIONAEY TIMES. 45 

beau's auxiliary army, also lodged at the CromivelVs 
Head when he was in Boston in 1782. He met there 
the renowned Paul Jones, whose excessive vanity led 
him to read to the company in the coffee-room some 
verses composed in his own honor, it is said, by Lady 
Craven. 

From the tavern of the gentry we pass on to the 
tavern of the mechanics, and of the class which Abra- 
ham Lincoln has forever distinguished by the title of 
the common people. 

Among such houses the Salutation, which stood at 
the junction of Salutation with North Street, is deserv- 
ing of a conspicuous place. Its vicinity to the ship- 
yards secured for it the custom of the sturdy North 
End shipwrights, caulkers, gravers, sparmakers, and the 
like, — a numerous body, who, while patriots to the 
backbone, were also quite clannish and independent in 
their feelings and views, and consequently had to be 
managed with due regard to their class prejudices, as 
in politics they always went in a body. Shrewd poli- 
ticians, like Samuel Adams, understood this. Governor 
Phips owed his elevation to it. As a body, therefore, 
these mechanics were extremely formidable, whether at 
the polls or in carrying out the plans of their leaders. 
To their meetings the origin of the word caucus is 
usually referred, the word itself undoubtedly having 
come into familiar use as a short way of saying caulkers' 
meetings. 

The Salutation became the point of fusion between 



46 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

leading Whig politicians and the shipwrights. More 
than sixty influential mechanics attended the first meet- 
ing, called in 1772, at which Dr. Warren drew up a 
code of by-laws. Some leading mechanic, however, was 
always chosen to be the moderator. The "caucus," as 
it began to be called, continued to meet in this place 
until after th^ destruction of the tea, when, for greater 
secrecy, it became advisable to transfer the sittings to 
another place, and then the Green Dragon, in Union 
Street, was selected. 

The Salutation had a sign of the sort that is said to 
tickle the popular fancy for what is quaint or humorous. 
It represented two citizens, with hands extended, bow- 
ing and scraping to each other in the most approved 
fashion. So the North-Enders nicknamed it "The Two 
Palaverers," by which name it was most commonly 
known. This house, also, was a reminiscence of the 
Salutation in Newgate Street, London, which was the 
favorite haunt of Lamb and Coleridge. 

The Green Dragon will probably outlive all its con- 
temporaries in the popular estimation. In the first 
place a mural tablet, with a dragon sculptured in relief, 
has been set in the wall of the building that now stands 
upon some part of the old tavern site. It is the only 
one of the old inns to be so distincruished. Its sicjn 
was the fabled dragon, in hammered metal, projecting 
out above the door, and was probably the counterpart 
of the Green Dragon in Bishopsgate Street, London. 

As a public house this one goes back to 1712, when 



IN BEVOLUTIONABY TIMES. 47 




THE GREEN DRAGON. 



Eichard PuUen kept it; and we also find it noticed, in 
1715, as a place for entering horses to be run for a 
piece of plate of the value of twenty-five pounds. In 
passing, we may as well mention the fact that Eevere 
Beach was the favorite race-ground of that day. The 
house was well situated for intercepting travel to and 
from the northern counties. 

To resume the historical connection between the Salu- 
tation and Green Dragon, its worthy successor, it appears 
that Dr. Warren continued to be the commanding figure 
after the change of location; and, if he was not already 
the popular idol, he certainly came little short of it, for 
everything pointed to him as the coming leader whom 
the exigency should raise up. Samuel Adams was 
popular in a different way. He was cool, far-sighted, 
and persistent, but he certainly lacked the magnetic 
quality. Warren was much younger, far more impetu- 
ous and aggressive, — in short, he possessed all the more 
brilliant qualities for leadership which Adams lacked. 
Moreover, he was a fluent and effective speaker, of 



48 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

graceful j)erson, handsome, affable, with frank and win- 
ning manners, all of which added no little to his popu- 
larity. Adams inspired respect, Warren confidence. As 
Adams himself said, he belonged to the "cabinet," 
while Warren's whole make-up as clearly marked him 
for the field. 

In all the local events preliminary to our revolu- 
tionary struggle, this Green Dragon section or junto 
constituted an active and positive force. It represented 
the muscle of the Eevolution. Every member was 
sworn to secrecy, and of .them all one only proved 
recreant to his oath. 

These w^ere the men who gave the alarm on the eve 
of the battle of Lexington, who spirited away cannon 
under General Gage's nose, and who in so many in- 
stances gallantly fought in the ranks of the republican 
army. Wanting a man whom he could fully trust, 
Warren early singled out Paul Eevere for the most 
important services. He found him as true as steel. A 
peculiar kind of friendship seems to have sprung up 
between the two, owing, perhaps, to the same daring 
spirit common to both. So when Warren sent word to 
Eevere that he must instantly ride to Lexington or all 
would be lost, he knew that, if it lay in the power of 
man to do it, the thing would be done. 

Besides the more noted of the tavern clubs there were 
numerous private coteries, some exclusively composed of 
politicians, others more resembling our modern debat- 
ing societies than anything else. These clubs usually 



IN REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. 49 

met at the houses of the members themselves, so ex- 
erting a silent influence on the body politic. The non- 
importation agreement originated at a private club in 
1773. But all were not on the patriot side. The crown 
had equally zealous supporters, who met and talked 
the situation over without any of the secrecy which 
prudence counselled the other side to use in regard to 
their proceedings. Some associations endeavored to hold 
the balance between the factions by standing neutral. 
They deprecated the encroachments of the mother- 
country, but favored passive obedience. Dryden has 
described them: 

"Not Whigs nor Tories they, nor this nor that, 
Nor birds nor beasts, but just a kind of bat, — 
A twilight animal, true to neither cause. 
With Tory wings but Whiggish teeth and claws." 

It should be mentioned that Gridley, the father of 
the Boston Bar, undertook, in 1765, to organize a law 
club, with the purpose of making head against Otis, 
Thatcher, and Auchmuty. John Adams and Fitch were 
Gridley's best men. They met first at Ballard's, and 
subsequently at each other's chambers; their "sodality," 
as they called it, being for professional study and ad- 
vancement. Gridley, it appears, was a little jealous of 
his old pupil, Otis, who had beaten him in the famous 
argument on the Writs of Assistance. Mention is also 
made of a club of which Daniel Leonard (Massachu- 
settensis), John Lowell, Elisha Hutchinson, Frank Dana, 



50 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

and Josiah Quincy were members. Similar clubs also 
existed in most of the principal towns in New Eng- 
land. 

The Sons of Liberty adopted the name given by 
Colonel Barre to the enemies of passive obedience in 
America. They met in the counting-room of Chase 
and Speakman's distillery, near Liberty Tree.^ Mackin- 
tosh, the man who led the mob in the Stamp Act riots, 
is doubtless the same person who assisted in throwing 
the tea overboard. We hear no more of him after this. 
The " Sons " were an eminently democratic organization, 
as few except mechanics were members. Among them 
were men like Avery, Crafts, and Edes the printer. All 
attained more or less prominence. Edes continued to 
print the Boston Gazette long after the Revolution. 
During Bernard's administration he was offered the 
whole of the government printing, if lie would stop his 
opposition to the measures of the crown. He refused 
the bribe, and his paper was the only one printed in 
America without a stamp, in direct violation of an Act 
of Parliament. The " Sons " pursued their measures with 
such vigor as to create much alarm among the loyalists, 
on whom the Stamp Act riots had made a lasting im- 
pression. Samuel Adams is thought to have influenced 
their proceedings more than any other of the leaders. 
It was by no means a league of ascetics, who had re- 
solved to mortify the flesh, as punch and tobacco were 
liberally used to stimulate the deliberations. 

1 Liberty Tree grew where Liberty Tree Block uow stands, corner 
of Essex and Washington Streets. 



IN REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. 51 

No important political association outlived the be- 
ginning of hostilities. All the leaders were engaged in 
the military or civil service on one or the other side. 
Of the circle that met at the Merchants' three were 
members of the Philadelphia Congress of 1774, one 
was president of the Provincial Congress of Massachu- 
setts, the career of two was closed by death, and that 
of Otis by insanity. 




L<^. 





IV. 

SIGIS^BOARD HUMOR. 

NOTHER tavern sign, though of later date, was 
that of the Good Woman, at the North End. 
This Good Woman was painted without a head. 




Still another board had painted on it a bird, a tree, a 
ship, and a foaming can, with the legend, — 

*' This is the bird that never flew, 
This is the tree which never grew, 
This is the ship which never sails, 
This is the can which never fails." 



SIGNBOARD HUMOR. 



53 



The Dog and Pot, Turk's Head, Tun and Bacchus, were 
also old and favorite emblems. Some of the houses 




1^yyy/^y^yy^y^^^y>yy^//y/^^^y^^. 



DOG AND POT. 



which swung these signs were very quaint specimens 
of our early achitecture. So, also, the signs themselves 
were not unfrequently the work of good artists. Smi- 
bert or Copley may have painted some of them. West 
once offered five hundred dollars for a red lion he had 
painted for a tavern sign. 

Not a few boards displayed a good deal of ingenuity 
and mother -wit, which was not without its effect, espe- 
cially upon thirsty Jack, who could hardly be expected 
to resist such an appeal as this one of the Ship in 
Distress : 

"With sorrows I am compass'd round; 
Pray lend a hand, my ship's aground." 

We hear of another signboard hanging out at the 
extreme South End of the town, on which was depicted 
a globe with a man breaking through the crust, like a 



54 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

chicken from its shell. The man's nakedness was sup- 
posed to betoken extreme poverty. 

So much for the sign itself. The story goes that 
early one morning a continental regiment was halted 
in front of the tavern, after having just made a forced 
march from Providence. The men were broken down 
with fatigue, bespattered with mud, famishing from hun- 
ger. One of these veterans doubtless echoed the senti- 




"HOW SHALL I GET THROUGH THIS WORLD?" 

ments of all the rest when he shouted out to the man 
on the sign, " 'List, darn ye ! 'List, and you'll get through 
this world fast enough ! " 

In time of war the taverns were favorite recruiting ren- 
dezvous. Those at the waterside were conveniently sit- 
uated for picking up men from among the idlers who 
frequented the tap-rooms. Under date of 1745, when we 
were at war with France, bills were posted in the town 
giving notice to all concerned that, " All gentlemen sailors 
and others, who are minded to go on a cruise off of 



SIGNBOARD HUMOR. 55 

Cape Breton, on board the brigantine Haivlc, Captain 
Philip Bass commander, mounting fourteen carriage, and 
twenty swivel guns, going in consort with the brigan- 
tine Ranger, Captain Edward Fryer commander, of the 
like force, to intercept the East India, South Sea, and 
other ships bound to Cape Breton, let them repair to 
the Widow Gray's at the Crown Tavern, at the head of 
Clark's Wharf, to go with Captain Bass, or to the Vernon's 
Head, Eichard Smith's, in King Street, to go in the 
Ranger. "Gentlemen sailors" is a novel sea-term that 
must have tickled an old salt's fancy amazingly. 

The following notice, given at the same date in the 
most public manner, is now curious reading. " To be 
sold, a likely negro or mulatto boy, about eleven years 
of age." This was in Boston. 

The Revolution wrought swift and significant change 
in many of the old, favorite signboards. Though the 
idea remained the same, their symbolism was now 
put to a different use. Down came the king's and up 
went the people's arms. The crowns and sceptres, the 
lions and unicorns, furnished fuel for patriotic bonfires 
or were painted out forever. With them disappeared 
the last tokens of the monarchy. The crown was 
knocked into a cocked-hat, the sceptre fell at the un- 
sheathing of the sword. The heads of Washington and 
Hancock, Putnam and Lee, Jones and Hopkins, now 
fired the martial heart instead of Yernon, Hawk, or 
Wolfe. Allegiance to old and cherished traditions was 
swept away as ruthlessly as if it were in truth but the 



56 OLD BOSTON TAVERNS. 

reflection of that loyalty which the colonists had now 
thrown off forever. They had accepted the maxim, that, 
when a subject draws his sword against his king, he 
should throw away the scabbard. 

Such acts are not to be referred to the fickleness of 
popular favor which Horace Walpole has moralized 
upon, or which the poet satirizes in the lines, — 

"Vernon, the Butcher Cumberland, Wolfe, Hawke, 
Prince Ferdinand, Granby, Burgoyne, Keppell, Howe, 
Evil and good have had their tithe of talk. 
And filled their sign-post then like Wellesly now." 

Eather should we credit it to that genuine and impas- 
sioned outburst of patriotic feeling which, having turned 
royalty out of doors, indignantly tossed its worthless 
trappings into the street after it. 

Not a single specimen of the old-time hostelries now 
remains in Boston. All is changed. The demon demo- 
lition is everywhere. Does not this very want of perma- 
nence suggest, with much force, the need of perpetuating 
a noted house or site by some appropriate memorial? 
It is true that a beginning has been made in this direc- 
tion, but much more remains to be done. In this way, 
a great deal of curious and valuable information may be 
picked up in the streets, as all who run may read. It 
has been noticed that very few pass by such memorials 
without stopping to read the inscriptions. Certainly, 
no more popular method of teaching history could well 
be devised. This being done, on a liberal scale, the 



SIGNBOARD HUMOR. 



57 



city would still hold its antique flavor through the 
records everywhere displayed on the walls of its build- 
ings, and we should have a home application of the 
couplet : 

"Oh, but a wit can study in the streets, 
And raise his mind above the mob he meets." 



> 




^ 



APPENDIX 



i^^^^^XS^ 



I 



APPENDIX. 




bosto:n^ taverks to tiee year isoo. 

HE Anchor, or Blue Anchor. Eobert Turner, 
vintner, came into x^ossession of the estate (Ricli- 

^ ard Fairbanks's) in 1652, died in 1664, and was 

succeeded in the business by his son John, who continued 
it till his own death in 1681; Turner's widow married 
George Monck, or Monk, who kept the AncJior until his de- 
cease in 1698 ; his widow carried on the business till 1703, 
when the estate probably ceased to be a tavern. The house 
was destroyed in the great fire of 1711. The old and new 
Globe buildings stand on the site. [See communication of 
William R. Bagnall in Boston Dailij Globe of April 2, 
1885.] Committees of the General Court used to meet 
here. (Hutchinson Coll., 345, 347.) 

Admiral Vernon, or Vernon's Head, corner of State 
Street and Merchants' Eow. In 1743, Peter Faneuil's 
warehouse was opposite. Eichard Smith kept it in 1745, 
Mary Bean in 1775 ; its sign was a portrait of the admiral. 

American Coffee-House. See British Coffee-House. 

Black Horse, in Prince Street, formerly Black Horse 
Lane, so named from the tavern as early as 1698. 

Brazen-Head. In Old Cornhill. Though not a tav- 
ern, memorable as the place where the Great Eire of 1760 
originated. 

BviU, lower end of Summer Street, north side ; demol- 
ished 1833 to make room "for the new street from Sea to 

Gl 



62 APPENDIX. 

Broad," formerly Flounder Lane, now Atlantic Avenue. 
It was then a very old building. Bull's Wharf and Lane 
named for it, 

Britisli Coffee-House, mentioned in 1762. John Bal- 
lard kei^t it. Cord Cordis, in 1771. 

Buncli of Grapes. Kept by Francis Holmes, 1712; 
William Coffin, 1731-33; Edward Lutwych, 1733; Joshua 
Barker, 1749 ; William Wetherhead, 1750 ; Rebecca Coffin, 
1760 ; Joseph Ingersoll, 1764 - 72. [In 1768 Ingersoll also 
had a wine-cellar next door.] Captain John Marston was 
landlord 1775-78; William Foster, 1782 ; Colonel Dudley 
Colman, 1783; James Vila, 1789, in which year he re- 
moved to Concert Hall ; Thomas Lobdell, 1789. Trinity 
Church was organized in this house. It was often de- 
scribed as being at the head of Long Wharf. 

Castle Tavern, afterward the George Tavern. North- 
east by Wing's Lane (Elm Street), front or southeast by 
Dock Square. For an account of Hudson's marital troubles, 
see Winthrop's New England, II. 249. Another house of 
the same name is mentioned in 1675 and 1693. A still 
earlier name was the "Blew Bell," 1673. It was in 
Mackerel Lane (Kilby Street), corner of Liberty Square. 

Cole's Inn. See the referred-to deed in P7'oc. Am. Ant. 
Soc, VII. p. 51. For the episode of Lord Leigh consult 
Old Landmarks of Boston, p. 109. 

Cromwell's Head, by Anthony Brackett, 1760 ; by his 
widow, 1764-68; later by Joshua Brackett. A two-story 
wooden house advertised to be sold, 1802. 

Crown Coffee-House. First house on Long Wharf. 
Thomas Selby kept it 1718-24; Widow Anna Swords, 
1749 ; then the property of Governor Belcher ; Belcher sold 
to Eichard Smith, innholder, who in 1751 sold to Eobert 
Sherlock. 

Crown Tavern. Widow Day's, head of Clark's Wharf ; 
rendezvous for privateersmen iii 1745. 



BOSTON TAVERNS TO THE YEAR 1800. 63 

Cross Tavern, corner of Cross and Ann Streets, 1732 ; 
Samuel Mattocks advertises, 1729, two young bears "very 
tame" for sale at the Sir/n of the Cross. Cross Street 
takes its name from the tavern. Perhaps the same as 
the Red Cross, in Ann Street, mentioned in 1746, and 
then kept by John Osborn. Men who had enlisted for 
the Canada expedition were ordered to report there. 

Dog and Pot, at the head of Bartlett's Wharf in Ann 
(North) Street, or, as then described. Fish Street. Bart- 
lett's Wharf was in 1722 next northeast of Lee's shipyard. 
Concert Hall was not at first a public house, but was 
built for, and mostly used as, a place for giving musical 
entertainments, balls, parties, etc., though refreshments 
were probably served in it by the lessee. A " concert of 
musick " was advertised to be given there as early as 1755. 
(See Landmarks of Boston.) Thomas Turner had a danc- 
ing and fencing academy there in 1776. As has been 
mentioned, James Vila took charge of Concert Hall in 
1789. The old hall, which formed the second story, was 
high enough to be divided into two stories when the 
building was altered by later owners. It was of brick, 
and had two ornamental scrolls on the front, which were 
removed when the alterations were made. 

Great Britain Coffee-House, Ann Street, 1715. The 
house of Mr. Daniel Stevens, Ann Street, near the draw- 
bridge. There was another house of the same name in 
Queen (Court) Street, near the Exchange, in 1713, where 
"superfine bohea, and green tea, chocolate, coffee-powder, 
etc.," were advertised. 

George, or St. George, Tavern, on the Neck, near 
Koxbury line. (See Landmarks of Boston.) Noted as 
early as 1721. Simon Rogers kept it 1730-34. In 1769 
Edward Bardin took it and changed the name to the 
King's Arms. Thomas Brackett was landlord in 1770. 



64 APPENDIX. 

Samuel Mears, later. During the siege of 1775 the tavern 
was burnt by the British, as it covered our advanced line. 
It was knoAvn at that time by its old name of the George. 

Golden Ball. Loring's Tavern, Merchants' Kow, corner 
of Corn Court, 1777. Kept by Mrs. Loring in 1789. 

General Wolfe, Town Dock, north side of Faneuil 
Hall, 1768. Elizabeth Coleman offers for sale utensils of 
Brew-House, etc., 1773. 

Green Dragon, also Freemason's Ai^ms. By Richard 
Pullin, 1712 '^ by Mr. Pattoun, 1715 ; Joseph Kilder, 1734, 
who came from the Three Cranes, Charlestown. John 
Gary was licensed to keep it in 1769 ; Benjamin Burdick, 
1771, when it became the place of meeting of the Revolu- 
tionary Club. St. Andrews Lodge of Freemasons bought 
the building before the Revolution, and continued to own 
it for more than a century. See p. 46. 

Hancock House, Corn Court; sign has Governor Han- 
cock's portrait, — a wretched daub ; said to have been the 
house in which Louis Philippe lodged during his short stay 
in Boston. 

Hat and Helmet, by Daniel Jones ; less than a quarter 
of a mile south of the Town-House. 

Indian Queen, Bine Bell, and stood on the site 

of the Parker Block, Washington Street, formerly Marl- 
borough Street. Nathaniel Bishop kept it in 1673. After 
stages begun running into the country, this house, then 
kept by Zadock Pomeroy, was a regular starting-place for 
the Concord, Groton, and Leominster stages. It was suc- 
ceeded by the AVashlng-ton Coffee-House. The Indian 
Queen, in Bromfield Street, was another noted stage-house, 
though not of so early date. Isaac Trask, Nabby, his widow, 
Simeon Boyden, and Preston Shepard kept it. The Brom- 
field House succeeded it, on the Methodist Book Concern 
site. 



BOSTON TAVERNS TO THE YEAR 1800. 



65 







JULIEN HOUSE. 



Julien's Restorator, corner of Congress and Milk 
streets. One of the most ancient buildings in Boston, when 
taken down in 1824, it having escaped the great fire of 
1759. It stood in a grass-plot, fenced in from the street. 
It was a private dwelling until 1794. Then Jean Baptiste 
Julien opened in it the first public eating-house to be estab- 
lished in Boston, with the distinctive title of "Eestora- 
tor," — a crude attempt to turn the French word restaurant 
into English. Before this time such places had always 
been called cook-shops. Julien was a Frenchman, who, 
like many of his countrymen, took refuge in America 
during the Eeign of Terror. His soups soon became 
famous among the gourmands of the town, while the 
novelty of his cuisine attracted custom. He was famil- 
iarly nicknamed the "Prince of Soups." At Julien's 



66 APPENDIX. 

death, in 1805, his widow succeeded him in the business, 
she carrying it on successfully for ten years. The fol- 
lowing lines were addressed to her successor, Frederick 
Rouillard : 

JXJLIEN'S RESTORATOR. 

I knew by the glow that so rosily shone 

Upon Frederick's cheeks, that he lived on good cheer; 

And I said, "If there's steaks to be had in the town, 
The man who loves venison should look for them here." 

'Twas two ; and the dinners were smoking aromid, 
The cits hastened home at the savory smell, 

And so still was the street that I heard not a sound 
But the barkeeper ringing the Coffee-House bell. 

" And here in the cosy Old Club,'" i I exclaimed, 

" With a steak that was tender, and Frederick's best wine, 

While under my platter a spirit-blaze flamed, 

How long could I sit, and how well could I dine I 

" By the side of my venison a tumbler of beer 

Or a bottle of sherry how pleasant to see, 
And to know that I dined on the best of the deer, 

That never was dearer to any than me ! " 

King's Head, by Scarlet's Wharf (northwest corner 
Fleet and North streets) ; burnt 1691, and rebuilt. Fleet 
Street was formerly Scarlet's Wharf Lane. Kept by 
James Davenport, 1755, and probably, also, by his widow. 
"A maiden divarf, fifty-two years old," and only twenty- 
two inches high, was "to be seen at Widow Bignall's, 
next door to the King's Head, in August, 1771. The 
old Kinr/s Head, in Chancery Lane, London, was the ren- 

^ The name of a room at Julien's. 



BOSTON TAVERNS TO THE YEAR 1800. 67 

dezvous of Titus Gates' party. Cowley the poet was born 
in it. 

Lamb. The sign is mentioned as early as 1746. Col- 
onel Doty kept it in 1760. The first stage-coach to Provi- 
dence put up at this house. The Adams House is on the 
same site, named for Laban Adams, who had kept the 
LaTiib. 

Lion, formerly Grand Turk. In Newbury, now Wash- 
ington, Street. (See Landmarks of Boston.) Kept by Israel 
Hatch in 1789. 

Liglit-Hovise and Anchor, at the North End, in 1763. 
Eobert Whatley then kept it. A Light-house tavern is 
noted in King Street, opposite the Town-House, 1718. 

Orang-e Tree, head of Hanover Street, 1708. Jonathan 
Wardwell kept it in 1712; Mrs. Wardwell in 1724; still 
a tavern in 1785. Wardwell set up here the first hackney- 
coach stand in Boston. 

Philadelphia, or North End Coffee-House, opposite 
the head of Hancock's Wharf. Kept by David Porter, 
father of the old Commodore and grandfather of the 
present Admiral. "Lodges, clubs, societies, etc., may be 
provided with dinners and suppers, — small and retired 
rooms for small company, — oyster suppers in the nicest 
manner." Formerly kept by Bennet. Occupied, 1789, by 
Robert Wyre, distiller. 

Punch Bowl, Dock Square, kept by Mrs. Baker, 1789. 

Qvieen's Head. In 1732 Joshua Pierce, innholder, is 
allowed to remove his license from the sign of the Log- 
wood Tree, in Lynn Street, to the Queen's Head, near 
Scarlet's Wharf, where Anthony Young last dwelt. 

Roehuck, north side of Town Dock (North Market 
Street). A house of bad repute, in which Henry Phillips 
killed Gaspard Dennegri, and was hanged for it in 1817. 
Roebuck passage, the alley-way through to Ann Street, 



68 APPENDIX. 

took its name from the tavern. It is now included in the 
extension northward of Merchants' Eow. 

Rose and Crown, near the fortification at Boston Neck. 
To be let January 25, 1728 : " enquire of Gillam Phillips." 
This may be the house represented on Bonner's map of 
1722. 

Red Lion, North Street, corner of Eichmond. Noticed 
as early as 1654 and as late as 1766. John Buchanan, 
baker, kept near it in 1712. 

Royal Exchange, State Street, corner Exchange. An 
antique two-story brick building. Noticed under this name, 
1711, then kept by Benjamin Johns ; in 1727, and also, in 
1747, by Luke Vardy. Stone kept it in 1768. Mrs. Mary 
Clapham boarded many British officers, and had several 
pretty daughters, one of whom eloped with an officer. The 
site of the Boston Massacre has been marked by a bronze 
tablet placed on the wall of the Merchants' Bank, opposite 
a wheel-line arrangement of the paving, denoting where 
the first blood of the Kevolution was shed. It was the 
custom to exhibit transparencies on every anniversary of 
the Massacre from the front of this house. The first stage- 
coach ever run on the road from Boston to New York was 
started September 7, 1772, by Nicholas Brown, from this 
house, "to go once in every fourteen days." Israel Hatch 
kept it in 1800, as a regular stopping-place for the Provi- 
dence stages, of which he was proprietor ; but upon the 
completion of the turnpike he removed to Attleborough. 

Salutation, North Street, corner Salutation. See p. 45. 
Noticed in 1708 ; Samuel Green kept it in 1731 ; William 
Campbell, who died suddenly in a fit, January 18, 1773. 

Seven Stars, in Summer Street, gave the name of 
Seven Star Lane to that street. Said to have stood on part 
of the old Trinity Church lot. "Near the Haymarket" 
1771j tlien kept by Jonathan Patten. 



BOSTON TAVERNS TO THE YEAR 1800. 69 

Shakespeare, Water Street, second house below Devon- 
shire ; kept by Mrs. Baker. 

Ship, corner Clark and North streets ; kept by John 
Vyall, 1666-67; frequently called Noah's Ark. 

Ship in Distress, vicinity of North Square. 

Star, in Hanover Street, corner Link Alley, 1704. Link 
Alley was the name given to that part of Union Street 
west of Hanover. Stephen North kept it in 1712 - 14. It 
belonged to Lieutenant-Governor Stoughton. 

State's Arms, also King's Arms. Colonel Henry 
Shrimpton bequeathed it to his daughter Sarah, 1666. 
Hugh Gunnison sold it to Shrimpton in 1651, the tavern 
being then the King's Arms. 

Sun. This seems to have been a favorite emblem, as 
there were several houses of the name. The Su7i in Bat- 
terymarch Street was the residence of Benjamin Hallo well, 
a loyalist, before it became a tavern. The estate was con- 
fiscated. General Henry Dearborn occupied it at one time. 
The sign bore a gilded sun, with rays, with this inscrip- 
tion : 

"The best Ale and Porter 
Under the Sun." 

Upon the conversion of the inn into a store the sign of 
the sun was transferred to a house in Moon Street. The 
Sun in Dock Square, corner of Corn Court, was earlier, 
going back to 1724, kept by Samuel Mears, who was 
"lately deceased" in 1727. It was finally turned into a 
grocery store, kept first by George Murdock, and then by 
his successor, Wellington. A third house of this name 
was in Cornhill (Washington Street), in 1755. Captain 
James Day kept it. There was still another Sun, near 
Boston Stone, kept by Joseph Jackson in 1785. 



70 



APPENDIX. 



Swan, in Fish, now Xortli Street, " by Scarlett's Wharf," 
1708. There was another at the South End, "nearly oppo- 
site Arnold Welles'," in 1784. 

Three Horse-Slioes, "in the street leading up to the 
Common," probably Tremont Street, Kept by Mrs. Glover, 
who died about 1744. William Clears kept it in 1775. 

White Horse, a few rods south of the Lamh. It had 
a white horse painted on the signboard. Kept by Joseph 
Morton, 1760, who was still landlord in 1772. Israel 
Hatch, the ubiquitous, took it in 1787, on his arrival from 
Attleborough. His announcement is unique. (See Land- 
marks of Boston, i)p. 392, 393.) 




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71 



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74 



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tended histories as useful as possible, I think it is extremely well 
adapted, and, if I may speak for others as well as myself, I believe it 
will be found of great convenience to the advanced students, and save 
them much labor and research. In my opinion your work ought to 
have a wide circulation." 

From JOHN WARD DEAN, N. E. Historic-Genealogical Society. 

" I think the plan of Mr. Drake's new book, ' The Making of New 
England,' is an excellent one, and its execution is equally praise- 
worthy. The author has the gift of making historical subjects attrac- 
tive, but he does not, as some writers do, perpetuate worthless tradi- 
tions and modern inventions for the purpose of making them so. The 
book is evidently the result of extended and conscientious research, as 
Mr. Drake's previous works have been, and his statement of facts can 
be relied upon." 

From Prof. E. N. HORSFORD, formerly of Harvard University. 
"I am impressed with the exhaustive research that qualified you 
to do this most useful and rare piece of literary effort. I shall get 
another copy as soon as I return to Cambridge that I may enrich the 
public library here (Shelter Island) with the best New England portrait 
of all the period you have chosen." 

From H. B. ADAMS, author of " Methods of Historical Study," etc., and 
Professor at Johns Hopkins University. 

"The book seems to me admirably adapted for its purpose, and 
tells the story of our fathers' migration and settlement in the most 
lucid way. I am delighted to see that you have introduced so much 
interesting material relating to the beginnings of New England. It is 
not often that I am willing to praise a book, but in this case the book 
and the cause are exceptionally good." 

75 



From Prof. W. H. VENABLE, of Cincinnati, O. 

" Your work will certainly be of great assistance to teachers. The 
plan of using your chapters as reading supplementary to the regular 
lesson in History is practicable, practical, and excellent." 

From S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE, Author of "A Dictionary of English 
Literature." 

"'The Making of New England,' by Samuel Adams Drake, is an 
admirable summary of one of the most important chapters in the 
history of civilization. It should be in every District Library of the 
Public Schools, as well as in every Private Collection ; and I hope it 
will be followed by similar manuals on all the subsequent epochs of 
the United States of America." 

From FRANCIS PARKMAN, Historian. 

"The picture of early colonial life is clear and excellent. In the 
hands of a competent teacher, the book will be very effective in ex- 
citing a wholesome interest in our early history." 



If your local bookseller cannot furnish, either of 
the above works, please address the author through Messrs. 
Charles Scribner's Sons, New York City. 





